“Get Yourself Out of Whatever Cage You Find Yourself In”: The Queerness of Form in Contemporary Queer Literature
Location
King Building 237
Document Type
Presentation
Start Date
4-27-2018 11:00 AM
End Date
4-27-2018 12:20 PM
Abstract
My capstone explores the creation of queer affect in three works of contemporary queer literature, Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home, Anne Carson’s Autobiography of Red, and Maggie Nelson’s The Argonauts. My focus is on the connection between the form of the work and its content. My research drew upon the primary texts, literary theory on form and genre, as well as queer theory. Most prior research attended to either the literary aspects or queer aspects of the work without considering them in conversation. I discovered that all three queered similar formal aspects - blending genres and pulling from a queer genealogy - in order to tell queer stories. This work creates the opportunity for new methods of queer literary analysis which build from the connection between form and content.
Keywords:
queer, literature, gender, sexuality, genre
Recommended Citation
Higgins, Elly, "“Get Yourself Out of Whatever Cage You Find Yourself In”: The Queerness of Form in Contemporary Queer Literature" (04/27/18). Senior Symposium. 1.
https://digitalcommons.oberlin.edu/seniorsymp/2018/presentations/1
Major
English
Advisor(s)
Harrod Suarez, English
Project Mentor(s)
David Walker, English
April 2018
“Get Yourself Out of Whatever Cage You Find Yourself In”: The Queerness of Form in Contemporary Queer Literature
King Building 237
My capstone explores the creation of queer affect in three works of contemporary queer literature, Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home, Anne Carson’s Autobiography of Red, and Maggie Nelson’s The Argonauts. My focus is on the connection between the form of the work and its content. My research drew upon the primary texts, literary theory on form and genre, as well as queer theory. Most prior research attended to either the literary aspects or queer aspects of the work without considering them in conversation. I discovered that all three queered similar formal aspects - blending genres and pulling from a queer genealogy - in order to tell queer stories. This work creates the opportunity for new methods of queer literary analysis which build from the connection between form and content.
Notes
Session I, Panel 1 - Identity | Performativity
Moderator: KJ Cerankowski, Assistant Professor of Comparative American Studies and Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies